Sidebar - Alex North Tribute

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THE SOUND OF MOVIES: MASTERS OF THE FILM SCORE

SIDEBAR - ALEX NORTH TRIBUTE

A TRIBUTE TO MY FATHER ALEX NORTH

My father’s name, Alex North, sounds familiar to so many people, yet time after time I’ve been asked “Who exactly was your father, what music did he write?”

I always try to find a concise answer to this question, to let the people know what an immense and important figure he was as a musician, composer, and a man. But it’s hard to briefly describe who he was, since he was such a complex, versatile, and talented personality, and at the same time very private and humble about his own achievements. Spending his entire life in service to music, my father lived for the immortal beauty of the music itself, not for his name in it.  When asked to express himself, he would always rather do it with music than with words, unless he was drinking with fellow musicians. On these occasions their conversations always turned from music to politics and back to music, often ending up with all night musical jam sessions or four-handed piano recitals played on my father’s two Steinway Grands in the family living room. John Williams, Jerry Goldsmith, André Previn, were among the many artists, composers, writers, and directors who were regulars around the house and partook in the musical and political evenings.

So, who was Alex North?  How about a composer, it is said, who changed the history of film music? The one who replaced the old fashioned romantic traditions of Steiner and Korngold with a fresh, contemporary Americana sound? The composer who brought jazz into film scoring? The composer who musically personalized the characters and their emotional insights in place of composing background, wall-to-wall music? A scholar who would do lengthy research in order to bring authentic sound to the big epic films? These numerous musical achievements were not only an expression of the wide scope of musical talents that he possessed, they also had roots in his strong classical training and academic education, his long-term experience composing for modern ballet and theater, as well as his belief that “the music should convey the internal, rather than external aspects of the film,” and be “related to the characters at all times and not the action.”

My father expressed his creativity in a very subtle and personal way and his music is a genuine, warm, glorious, and humane reflection of his own inner being. He strongly stood by his personal beliefs not only as a musician but also as a man. He always believed in the fight for social justice, he believed in trusting relationships and friendship, he loved to live, and he lived to love life’s pleasures and the people, from all walks, who surrounded him. Warm, kind, soft spoken, my father was loved, respected and admired by so many peers, colleagues, film scholars, fans, and most of all by his close friends, his second wife Anna, and his three children, Jasmine, Dylan and me.

Alex North marked the last century of film making with his visionary approach to film scoring, and by doing so he immeasurably enriched film history with his unforgettable scores. I had the privilege of working with him on two films I produced: SHANKS, for which he was nominated for an Academy Award® for Best Original Score, and on his last film, which he composed while bed ridden with cancer, THE LAST BUTTERFLY, directed by the extraordinary Czech Director Karel Kachyna. Dad died before the film was released in 1991.

As John Williams said about my father in his preface to Sanya Henderson’s “Alex North, a Biography”, “Alex North was an inspiration, a role model and a hero. He was then and remains so today.” He was a musicians’ musician. A very special man and an inspiring father.  I miss him and think of him often, especially when I hear his most well known popular composition “Unchained Melody” recorded and played again and again in every part of the world.

Steven North with Dr. Sanya Henderson


NOTE:

Guest for The Last Butterfly.